


it's been a while, now

by alpacas



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, Gen, tumblr request fills
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-08-22
Packaged: 2020-01-23 12:34:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 13,462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18549865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alpacas/pseuds/alpacas
Summary: [tumblr prompts and drabbles!]





	1. caleb, jester — "glitter"

**Author's Note:**

> just a collection of various [drabbles of mine!](https://all-pacas.tumblr.com/tagged/helen%27s-fanfic-i-need-a-tag-for-my-fanfic-that-isn%27t-weird) being a trash and predictable person, mostly they're about nott!
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> **kitkatcabbit asked: For your prompt thing! Caleb + Jester + glitter**

The bandits had a sort of stash, there behind the rocks: a few coins, a few glass gemstones, and a wicked looking dagger with a reddish blade. Fjord calls for Caleb, who takes the dagger and pulls out his spellbook, his fingers already going to exactly the right page (he can do this in his sleep, he sometimes thinks; were it not for the fun of understanding and discovering, he might need reflect on his main function to the Mighty Nein being a first level Identify spell —)

When he pulls open the book, he blinks and coughs and flinches as a cloud of pink — something — he leaps back with an undignified yelp, and glitter spills out across the pages, into his lap, onto his sleeves and hands and face.

“Ahhh!!” Jester has been healing Beau about twenty feet away; now she jumps to her feet and knocks Beau over in her haste to reach Caleb. For half a second he thinks she’s coming to heal him, he’s sitting stunned, but she just flings out her arms. “TA-DAH…!” she trails off. “Ahh, Caleb, you ruined it! You weren’t supposed to find it until later so I could be right there and go, hey, Caleb, would you look at your book for me, and then…” Jester glares down at him. “Shitballs.”

Caleb runs his hand over his face and beard. His palm comes back pink with glitter.


	2. nott, jester — "pastries."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **twinvax asked: Nott jester pastries**

“Here, Nott, would you like a pastry?” Jester doesn’t even wait for an answer, already handing Nott a sticky chocolate cupcake, dripping with frosting.

“Thank you,” Nott says politely. She takes a moment to decide her approach and angle before — CHOMP! — eating half of it in one bite. She chews contentedly, but then catches a look at Jester, holding her cupcake primly as she licks off the frosting. Nott’s stomach sinks. Jester looks so dainty. She’s suddenly conscious of her green skin and sharp teeth and smears of frosting on her chin. “Is — is that the right way to eat cupcakes?” she asks timidly.

“I don’t think there’s a right way to eat a cupcake,” Jester says, still licking. “I just like to do this, it tastes nice, I like the frosting, you know? It tastes better like this, probably.”

Nott examines her half eaten cupcake, then takes a swipe with her tongue at the remaining frosting: chocolatey and hyper-sweet. “It’s good. It's — it's nice this way."

“Right? Isn’t it?” Jester giggles. She smiles, her mouth dark with chocolate.


	3. caduceus — "coffee"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: caduceus and coffee for the livejournal sentence meme?**

Fjord blinks and bends at the waist to peer under the table. Half of the Mighty Nein have gathered around one table at the inn, but Jester and Nott…

“What the hell are you two doing?” he asks, even though the answer is ‘hiding under a table.’

“Shh! Shh! We’re stealthing!” Nott hisses; she actually is blending in uncannily well with the table legs.

Jester, however… “Nott switched out Caduceus’s tea with coffee!” she says loudly, bumping her head against the top of the table as she bounces from the excitement. “I created a distraction!”

“And I used the rank stuff you drink!” Nott finishes proudly.

Fjord straightens up and looks over at the others, who seem to be having a calm, normal breakfast. He crouches down under the table. “ _Why_?”

“Because it might be funny.”

“Because he’s never had caffiene and it might be funny.”

“Fjord, what if he gets really hyper? What if it’s super weird and funny?”

“And you all are hiding down under here because…” Fjord asks, scooting a bit farther under the table himself.

“Oh. I guess it just seems more sneaky,” Nott says. It is seriously uncanny how hard she is to spot, even two feet away from her. Downright creepy.

Fjord sits down on his knees. “If you guys say so, I guess.”

 

 

 

At at the other table, Caleb glances up from his book. “Where are the, ah, dynamic duo? It isn’t like them to miss breakfast.”

“Under that table over there,” Caduceus says placidly, sipping from his cup. “Beau, would you please hand me the jam?”

“Sure, no problem,” Beau says with her mouth full of eggs. She hands him the jar. Caduceus smiles his thanks, his hands shaking.

 

 


	4. caleb, nott — "hug"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **moonstruckthespian asked: are you still doing the writing prompts? may i throw out a caleb & nott "hug" because i love these nerds and i want them to be happy and affectionate**

The little goblin flinches away whenever Caleb  comes too close. The one time they’d almost run into guards in an alley, he’d put his hand on her shoulder, stepped before her, and could feel her entire body go stiff and trembling. She doesn’t like to be touched. Fair enough. He’s cautious with her after that, but it isn’t difficult: Caleb doesn’t like to be touched, either.

They sleep side by side in fields and under trees. They save coin and spend it on inns and better food and new boots and new bandages, stay up late working out better cons. They become a team. Partners. Of a fashion. They share a bed in cheap inns, Nott curled up at the foot and Caleb curled up to one side. 

If he touches her shoulder, she no longer flinches. If she tugs at his coat or touches his hand to get his quiet attention, he turns at once. His feet butt up against her spine some nights. She’s a sound sleeper, he’s found. He prods at her gently with his toes, feeling the heat from her body. The hardness of her bones.

They pretend she is his daughter in towns. Wrap her up in her cloak and his: she’s sick, they say. He holds her hand. Her fingers are long and strange and surprisingly strong, her skin calloused and dry. Her hand is warm.

But Caleb doesn’t like to be touched.

( _his parents — mutter would always hug him, touch his face, his cheeks, fix his hair, long after he felt he was too old, much too old and too much of a man for such fussing. vater behind him, patting his back or his shoulder. we’re so proud of you, my boy._

_mutter kissing his cheeks and mouth on his first day of school, ignoring his embarrassment, his blush. sitting on vater’s lap as a small child as vater pointed up at the stars and toussled his hair.)_

But: He doesn’t like to be touched.

One day they travel too far from a town. It’s always a fine line: close enough to be safe, far enough to not be noticed or seen. Skirting farms is the best strategy, keeping within a day of some place with Crownsguard to drive monsters and bandits away. They stray too far and Caleb is awoken by bandits crossing the threshold of his Alarm.

He shakes Nott and leaps to his feet: she skitters up and runs and he’s left alone, his heart in his throat, his stomach sinking: he had begun to forget. Begun to forget he was alone. That even this girl would so quickly —

There are four bandits. He raises his hands. They want money or food and Caleb has four gold and a handful of copper. He’s polite. Looking at the ground. His fingers itch and hum with fire: he is angry. He is humiliated. That he’d trusted Nott wouldn’t run at the first —

He does not call his fire. One of the bandits leans over Caleb’s rucksack.

There is a soft noise, and the bandit collapses face first into the bag. His companion cries out and moves towards his fallen friend — Caleb doesn’t move, the other two still have blades on him, their eyes now widening with fear and fury —

 _Fwwp!_ One of the bandits standing guard over Caleb raises his hand to his throat as if swatting a gnat, and then falls, his throat red and bloody around the bolt of a crossbow. 

Caleb runs backwards, away — he has nothing, nothing but fire, and so he instead reaches into his pocket and mutters and casts _Dancing Lights,_ throwing all three at the remaining two bandits: they yell and cover their faces, blind and expecting more deadly magic. _Fwwp!_ A third falls.

“Stay back!” Caleb calls, waving his hands meaninglessly, ominously, now that there is a good thirty feet between him and the final bandit. “I have powerful magic, and I will kill you, and it will be —” 

The bandit looks at him. Then looks elsewhere, realizing as Caleb had that someone is shooting him from the bushes, that the attacks have not come from Caleb himself. The bandit unsheathes his blade. Caleb waits for a fourth bolt. The bandit walks towards the nearest tree. “Come out, you motherfucker.”

“Do not move! Or I will, with magic, destroy you!” Caleb calls desperately, his lights floating harmlessly, prettily, at eye level.

The bandit looks behind the first tree and moves towards another.

Caleb summons a bolt of fire.

He hits his target: a large rock a few feet to the right of the bandit. There is an explosion of flame, and the bandit shouts and stumbles, and _FWIP!_ the final bolt flies out from the tree he had been approaching, striking him dead in the chest.

The bandit begins to rush for Nott, and Caleb runs —

The final bolt hits the bandit in the eye. He falls, still running, slamming face first into the earth. Caleb skids to a halt. The fire has already burnt itself out. The four bodies lie all around him. His heart is pounding in his throat, in his mouth. 

A small figure darts out from behind her tree and throws herself at Caleb, who stands frozen, uncertain, trembling, as Nott wraps her arms around his knees. “Caleb, I’m so sorry! I froze up and then he saw me and I froze up again! Are you okay? Are you hurt?” 

He drops to his knees and she throws her arms around him again, around his neck, her arms thin but strong. Caleb stares straight ahead, glassy-eyed, feeling Nott’s tiny body shaking. “I - I am fine, I am alright, little one,” he says. He lifts his arm. Freezes. Slowly, carefully, ever so — he puts his arm around her trembling body. And then the other, gripping her shoulders, leaning forward on his knees to that his chin rests against the top of her head, her mussed hair, as she buries her face in his shoulder. 

“You’re not hurt, you’re not hurt, are you?” 

“No, no, I’m fine, I’m sorry I froze up, I was really scared…”

“I was frightened as well, I —”  _I thought you had left me_ , he thinks, ashamed of himself, shocked by his relief. Shocked by his need. “I am glad you are safe, Nott,” he murmurs, staring ahead at the bodies, at the clearing.

“Me too, I’m glad you’re okay, I’m really glad,” she says, her voice thick and muffled by his coat. She’s warm. He doesn’t know why that surprises him, but it does. She’s tiny and thin and warm in his arms, this goblin girl. This… partner. This friend of his. 

Caleb closes his eyes tight.

They sit like that for a long, long while.


	5. caleb, trent — "diamond"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **nothingnessla asked: For the prompt, I would say “Caleb, Trent”, and “diamond” :3**

He turns the diamond around in his hands. 

“Is there a problem, Brendan?” Master Ikithon asks, smiling thinly. 

“Oh — no, of course not, sir.” Bren clears his throat, his fingers closing around the diamond. He keeps his eyes respectfully lowered, but is aware of Ikithon’s gaze upon him. His squeezes his hand, the edges of the gem cutting into his palm.

The truth is, he’s never even seen a diamond before. Not a real one, not up close. Just glass cut to resemble the real thing. Stupid, to care, Bren knows, but Ikithon had handed it to him and he’d immediately thought of the cost. It’s more than his father makes in a month of work. Almost double. 

“Yes,” Master Ikithon says placidly. “You come from a meager background, don’t you?” 

“Ah —” he’s briefly unsure: does he disagree? Defend his father? “Yes, sir,” Bren murmurs. 

“This diamond is a tool for your spells, just as your other components are. Try not to get distracted by your… unexpected fortune.” Ikithon smiles, and Bren’s guts plummet into his naval. 

“I won’t, sir. Thank you again.”

“And don’t forget,” Ikithon says, raising one eyebrow at Bren’s accidental interruption. “This is just a stone.” Bren thinks of his father. Of his mother, scraping together coin at the month’s end. “Do not think it an end, or a reward. It is a tool, just as you are. When you grow stronger, you will earn more valuable rewards. That diamond is nothing. _You_ are nothing.” 

“Yes, sir,” Bren says, his face flushing, the diamond pinching in the meat of his palm.

Ikithon smiles kindly at him. “Do not fret, Brendan. You will improve.”


	6. nott, jester — "newpetowner"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: nott, jester, new/pet/owner counts as one word, nott getting the pet :P**

“I don’t want it,” Nott says, holding the kitten up by the scruff. It mews, all fluffy soft fur and big blue kitten eyes and a blue silk bow around its neck to make it look, just, like the cutest kitten ever to exist. She tries to hand it back to Jester.

“No takebacks! She’s a birthday present!” 

“It’s not my birthday! What did we say, my birthday is, it’s like in fall, right? It’s _ages_  away. I don’t want a pet.” 

“That’s not your birthday, that’s the fake birthday Caleb gave you because we thought you didn’t have a — isn’t she so sweet? Don’t you just love her?” Jester pleads, perhaps wisely realizing she’d better focus on the real argument.

“Nope.” Nott puts down the kitten gently. It immediately rolls onto its back, exposing its tummy, one paw swiping up in the air. 

Jester squeals and scoops the kitten close to her  breast. “Nott! She’s the sweetest kitten who ever, ever lived, and she’s _all yours,_ you’re _so lucky_. What will you name her?”

Nott stares down the kitten, her own eyes yellow but almost catlike. 

“What about Sapphire, after me, your best friend who got you the _best_ birthday present? Or what about Cutiepie, or Donut —”

“CALEB!” Nott yells, turning to look over her shoulder. “JESTER GOT YOU A CAT FOR MY BIRTHDAY, DO YOU WANT IT?”

Caleb immediately yells back from across the tavern: “JA, OF COURSE I DO, I WILL BE JUST A MOMENT.”

“No, Nott! She’s yours!” Jester’s face starts to fall, and Nott almost feels bad about it. 

“Jessie, I don’t like pets,” she says, a little more seriously. “And animals don’t like me, either.”

“Don’t be stupid, you’re very nice, you’re a really nice person, Nott.”

“I’m a _goblin_ ,” Nott reminds her, dropping her voice since they are in a public space. “To Afternoon Snack over there, I’m a scary predator.”

“You’d never hurt her, she’s so cute.”

“I’ve eaten Frumpkin twice.”

Caleb rushes up to the table. “There’s a cat? Oh, look at this cat!” He seizes the kitten from Jester. “Look at you! What is your name?” 

“Cinnamon,” says Jester.

“Breakfast,” says Nott, which is a mistake because now both Jester _and_ Caleb look over at her with horrified betrayal in their eyes. 

Nott sighs. 

It’s going to be a long fucking day.


	7. nott, yeza — "kissing"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **twinvax asked: nott, yeza, kissing**

The fourth or fifth sentence Veth ever said to him — certainly within the first hour of their first real conversation — was “okay, we can be friends, but you’re not gonna kiss me again. We’re not going to kiss. Ever. You got that?”

“Um.” She watched suspiciously as Yeza chose his words. Was he going to argue? Also: was she really going to hate it if he did? Maybe it made her a wench or a tease if so. She didn’t know. It was weird enough they had kissed, one time, and that was probably why she kept thinking about it. But if they were going to be friends, she didn’t want him getting the wrong idea, to think that she liked it or cared or wanted to do it again, or had been keeping an eye out for him around town, never saying anything before now, of course, but just to see. Just to. You know. See if he was talking to anyone else. Or something.

“That’s okay,” Yeza says at last. “I don’t want to kiss you.” She squints. He turns red. “I mean — I’m not saying — I didn’t — Um. It’s just, we’re friends. Now. I guess.”

“Right,” says Veth, somehow completely dissatisfied about getting her way.

“Not that — Um. Not that I minded… doing it. The one time. But just because we’re friends.”

“Good. Yeah. Same, me too.” She blinks, feeling very confused about everything, all of a sudden. “So long as we’re clear.”


	8. yasha, jester — "tea"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **sovvngarde asked: Yasha, Jester, tea?**

“Here! Do you want to try some tea?” Jester pushes the cup into Yasha’s hands before she can say yes or no. The cup is warm and fragrant with a spicy brownish liquid; Yasha takes a sniff, her nose wrinkling. It isn’t unpleasant, just… strong.

“Did Caduceus make it?” she asks.

“Nope! He’s always mixing up different plants and flowers and so I thought, I can probably do that too, probably, so I made my own tea! Is it good? Do you like it?” Jester looks so eager than Yasha almost smiles.

She takes a cautious sip. The texture is— grainy. And spicy. And burns her tongue. She coughs and winces.

“Is it bad?”

“N… no, it’s just… what is it?” Yasha asks, trying not to cough. It’s not bad. It’s _awful_.

“Cinnamon tea,” Jester says. She takes the cup back and takes a big gulp… her expression freezes.

“Maybe next time… filter it first?”

Jester’s eyes water as she stubbornly drains the mug. “What are you talking about… it’s so good…” Tears are streaming down her cheeks. “Sprinkle, do you want some tea?”

The little weasel curled in the hollow of her neck turns and hides in her cloak.

“It’s so good!” Jester insists, her face screwed up in wet discomfort.

“Sure,” Yasha says. “Yeah. It’s great tea…”


	9. caleb, nott — "killed in battle"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: Nott and Caleb prompt - because my heart loves only sadness, some kind of scenario where Nott's killed in battle and revived again but from Caleb's perspective?**

It all happens in a heartbeat — in the space between Caleb gasping for breath, clutching his bleeding arm, scrabbling, pained, frantic, away from the giant’s spiked mace — swinging at him, slashing heavy-hot through his forearm, the pain leaving him dizzy and stunned and scrambling, moving away, trying to focus, calm his mind and concentrate on the words of a spell —

Eight seconds. 

One, two, three: He trips and stumbles and slides, his legs giving under him, he moves one way and the giant moves another, distracted.

Four, five, six: Caleb turns back towards the monster, raising his hand as it swipes with its mace: lazily, deceptively slow, an almost gentle arc; he mutters the first few words; the giant swings —

Seven: The mace stops. Hits an object with a muffled soft sound, a quiet _fwmm_ of steel and iron hitting something soft and cloth covered and small.

Eight: Nott’s tiny body flies, falls, is thrown five, ten, twelve feet and collapses in a tiny bundle of green cloak, dark hair; Caleb looks under the giant’s massive arm and sees a small dark shape: the sole of her foot, sticking from under her cloak.

 

 

“Nott!” Jester shrieks.

There is a crackling of dark energy: Fjord’s magic, briny and heavy, pushes past Caleb, hitting the giant square in the back, pulsing and spreading tendrils through the creature’s skin. It bellows and turns back; Caleb ducks, his spell lost; he sees Jester rushing up to Nott, he looks back at the giant; he’s lost his spell, he’s lost the words, what was he doing? What is he — 

Beau leaps up and hits the giant’s head with her staff, Yasha cleaves at its other arm at the same moment, Caleb abandons his first plan — had he a plan? — and reaches out with fire. 

The giant roars and stumbles to its knees. Calm, frozen, cold, Yasha cleaves through its skull, her gaze implacable. 

Caleb struggles to catch his breath.

“Shit,” says Fjord, moving past Caleb with his sword still loose in hand. Caleb takes it as a remark on the battle, the situation; he closes his eyes, his heart still racing. 

Ninety-seven seconds have passed.

“Nott, you okay?” Fjord calls out. Jester is sitting beside Nott, healing her, and Caleb pushes himself forward, reaching her at the same moment as Caduceus, expecting to see Nott grumpy and bruised, lazy the way she gets when hurt — wanting to be petted and taken care of but unable to quite admit it, and Caleb is prepared to offer her his back, to carry her out of here if she would like —

“Caduceus! Caduceus, she’s not —!” Jester says, looking past Caleb, her voice shaking and wet. 

One.

He feels his heart beat. His pulse in his throat, behind his eyes, in his injured arm, the blood pounding hot and painful. He feels it stop.

Two.

Nott still and unmoving and pale, her eyes half open, her ears limp, one lying over her cheek and nose. There is little blood. Her body, so small and thin and frail, lies relaxed and limb and uneven on its side, her chest caved inward, concave, crushed, broken, unbreathing, unmoving, un—

Three.

Jester’s face, wet and tearstained with panic and fear, having thought, too, that Nott was hurt, yes, unconscious, perhaps, but able to be healed, able to be fixed, the dusty texture of her magic cold around Nott’s cooling body, the failed healing spell, the wrong choice, there being nothing left to heal —

Four.

Caduceus kneeling, enveloping Jester and the body behind his large frame —

Five, six, seven, eight, nine.

A flash and the heaviness of Caduceus’s magic, the air illuminated by shards of crystal dust, the smell of rotting vegetation, pungent fruit, Caleb starts to fall, to stumble forward, is prevented by some force, something anchoring his shoulder and pulling him back, upright, keeping him on his feet, he hears only buzzing and ringing, he feels nothing, he sees nothing, he does not move or breathe.

(He remembers: Lorenzo standing over an unmoving figure. Beau’s cry of pain. Caduceus underground, not long ago, Jester’s unshaking hands against his bloodied torso. 

Watching a fire consume a house, and knowing — and knowing — by now — by now —)

Ten. Eleven. Twelve.

His fingers are shaking, his limbs are cold, his blood cooling, no longer pumping through his limbs, his heart. Jester cries out with wordless relief. Caduceus’s shoulders slump. 

Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen.

“You’re okay!” Jester says.

Fjord pushes past Caleb and Beau — it is Beau, he sees now, who is holding him firm by the shoulder. 

“Did you… Thank you,” says Nott weakly.

“Least I could do,” Caduceus says calmly, his voice warm.

“I mean… considering last time around I kind of killed you…” There is a flutter of movement. Jester helps Nott sit up. Caleb catches a glimpse: her hair loose in her face, her skin pale and bloodless. 

“I’m not really the grudge bearing type,” says Caduceus, as Caleb pushes forward, Beau releasing him from her grip and her strength —

He stumbles, really, has to catch himself on Caduceus’s broad shoulder for balance. Nott is sitting upright, leaning against Jester’s side and shoulder, although she looks unhurt — her body no longer crushed and broken, simply pale, a bloom of purple bruising creeping from her exposed collar and up  her neck. Her whole torso must be — 

Caleb almost vomits. Right there and then.

“Are you okay?” Jester asks, petting Nott’s hair, relieved and no longer teary, biting her lip. 

“Sure,” Nott says, looking down at her hands. “Much easier the second time.” A joke with trembling fingers and too much bite. Caleb tastes the bile in his throat and in his mouth, hits his knees when he falls to the stone floor before them. 

“I’m okay,” Nott says, her eyes flickering up, to him and then to Jester and then to him and then to her lap, her pupils wide and fearful, her expression glazed. “I’m sorry if I worried…”

He means to grasp her hands. He touches her fingers and they’re cold as bone, trembling in her lap, and somehow or another she propels herself up and forward and into his arms, onto his knees, hiding against his chest, inside his open coat. His arms wrap around her tightly, clutching at her. She is very cold, and smells of earth and compost, fungus and moss, life brought from death and decay. She is pulling at his shirt, her nails piercing and pinching him through the thin cloth. He holds her, surprised that his heart is beating, his breath is racing, his body is warm. 

Caduceus smiles gently at nothing, at them all. Fjord clasps Jester’s shoulder cautiously. Caleb sits and breathes and holds onto Nott, his eyes dry, his heart beating, thinking of nothing at all.

Five minutes and nineteen seconds.

 


	10. nott — "signature"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: Nott + signature**

Magic leaves traces. Caleb is attuned to the signs, to the feel — a sort of tugging in his head that his mind interprets through his other senses. 

_How come you can tell if an item is magic or not_? Nott asks him once, twisting the ring she borrowed from Jester around her finger. He’d previously identified it, it allows one to walk on water, but Caleb had just told it to her again, for her interest, to show off a little. He is not above wanting to impress her, his little friend.

So he’d explained: he has a spell that picks up on that sense, makes it — louder.

You hear magic?

Well, no. Not literally. He tries to explain. Hasn’t she ever noticed, that when Fjord casts one of his spells —

I can see it, yeah. He’s all ‘Eldritch Blast!’ and there’s like an icicle of black magic crap.

And you can feel it was well, if you attune yourself. If you hold yourself alert. To me, it is not just black crap, but — Caleb falters, trying to explain. The heaviness, a thudding, almost a vibration, a phantom taste of brine. The way Nott’s ring pulses with an oily light.

My spell, it… makes me more sensitive. I can see the magic. Tell what sort it is. You may be able to learn the spell; it may be useful for you.

Why? I mean, it’s really great that you can do it, but I don’t think it would help me any.

Well, in looking for traps. For magical traps.

There are _magical_ traps?

Ja.

What’s Jester’s magic taste like? Nott asks after a long, thoughtful silence.

It doesn’t have a taste, it’s not really a taste, it’s more that the mind —

Right. What’s it taste like? Pastries?

Caleb smiles. Yes, let’s say so. 

Your magic?

I do not know. Like — like myself, I suppose, whatever that is. He wonders, bitterly: like dirt and sweat? Like ash? Doesn’t say that aloud. Nott, it isn’t really a _taste_ , perhaps I didn’t explain it well. It’s — when something touches you, or the air moves, you can sense it, because it is separate from you, yes? Or — or when you sneeze, it is because there is a speck of dirt in your nose, and your body reacts to it. It is not a real thing, it is a _feeling_ , a reaction. It is foreign, and so it makes your hair prickle.

I guess so.

That’s what magic feels like. A bit. If you keep studying with me, you’ll begin to notice it too.

Maybe. Nott is dubious. She plays with her borrowed ring. Does my magic taste like — does it make you sneeze, or whatever?

Ah — no. I don’t think so.

She shoots him a look. 

He smiles. You don’t have to test it.

Too late! She grasps for her wire. He hears an odd double whisper: Nott, a foot away, speaking with her voice, hearing it echo in his mind. Oooooh, maaaaagic, she whispers.

Nothing, he says, amused.

She rummages in her pocket. A money purse, overflowing with sparkling gold and shining buttons, appears on the bed before him. The mattress doesn’t sink under the weight, and otherwise the illusion is perfect. 

What does it taste like? 

Nothing.

Hmph. Nott, disgruntled, vanishes the coin purse.

Did you want it to have a taste? Illusions are by their nature hard to detect, and especially for you…

I was just curious, that’s all.

It is not surprising I cannot detect your magic as easily, he tells her gently. I am most aware of spells that may harm me. The ones that feel — 

Careful, I also have that one that makes you fall over laughing.

His mouth twitches. 

The ones that feel foreign. Unfamiliar to me.

Oh. She thinks about it, and blushes a mossy green. Good.

He thinks: Spring leaves unfurling. Fresh, clean rainwater.


	11. caleb, nott — "human pillow"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: Maybe something based on what you were saying before about how Nott most definitely uses Caleb as a human pillow constantly (andhethinksit'sadorable)?**

He is large enough and she is small enough that even a standard sized bed is easy to share. A few weeks of traveling together, and the idea of modesty, of one giving up the mattress for the other to sleep on the floor, strikes them both as ridiculous; they don’t even discuss it. Caleb takes the left side of the bed, Nott curls up on the right, and in the morning he wakes up and finds the little goblin using his calves as a pillow.

That’s the start of it.

 

There is no privacy between them. Oh, Nott is very careful only to change her clothing when Caleb has gone to the privy, she very politely looks away if he has cause to remove his shirt or trousers, but he removes them anyway. He sees her not as a _girl_ or a _woman_ but simply as _Nott,_ her body and presence simply there, the way Frumpkin can be. It isn’t an insult. 

One night they sleep in an inn’s common room with half a dozen others. A man walks past Caleb in the night, brushing his leg accidentally: Caleb is upright, heart pounding, half a spell cast before he realizes where he is  and what he’s doing. He doesn’t sleep well around other people, he tells Nott, when they’ve been kicked out of the same inn and are walking along the road an hour later. He’s — too wary. He’d honestly prefer to sleep outside than in a common room. 

You should have said so before we spent two copper, she frets.

I thought you might like to sleep indoors for a change.

Don’t be silly. It doesn’t matter to me where we sleep, I’m just a goblin. 

They find a grove to camp out in, sleep the few hours left in the night on the dirt and grass. He wakes up from a sound slumber, cold and stiff in the dawn, with Nott’s head pillowed on his left arm and wrist, his hand numb and tingling. He wakes up at dawn.

It’s not an insult at all.

 

 

The physical aspects of their friendship comes slowly, actually. 

Caleb notes early on that Nott tends to gravitate towards him in her sleep: she is often apologetic, embarrassed, avoiding looking above his knees the next morning. As a test, he has Frumpkin sleep near her, and finds her cuddling the cat in the mornings. It isn’t personal, then. Nott just — and he almost, nearly, smiles — is a cuddler. 

She starts reaching out for his hand when he’s scared. She tugs on his coat or sleeves until he develops the habit of squatting when he speaks to her. If he leaves his hand free, he’ll often feel her reach for it. Brushing at his knuckles with her long fingers. Grasping his palm for a second and letting it go. 

The first time she hugs him, they’ve only just gotten away from some Crownsguard — Caleb is nauseous, his heart pounding in his throat, and then he staggers as a small, soft body collides with his legs, arms wrapping around his thighs. (The crown of her head is just about crotch level, he _does_ notice, can’t exactly not, but he puts his hand on her hair.) 

Caleb, I was so scared! she whispers, her voice high and reedy. He pats her head. She hugs him.

It surprises him, honestly. He hadn’t realized goblins — he knows very little about goblins, in fact. But Caleb hadn’t thought they were the type to crave physical comfort and affection.

 

She kisses him for the first time on the cheek, her lips chapped and dry, his face growing hot from her touch.

 

One day he wakes up and realizes she has burrowed herself into the space between his torso and his arm, is warm and gently snoring, and his free arm is draped over her. One day he wakes up and thinks only that he is glad she’s there, drooling on his forearm, one of her teeth very slightly digging in.

 

Bad habits creep up on you.

 

What are you reading? Nott asks one day, six hours into their third day sitting in a cart. 

She’s too small to ride one of the horses alone, and is bored and restless. Caleb feels a pressure on his back and shoulders, neck and head, as she drapes herself over him, her chin digging into his hair. He slumps. Her elbows dig into his shoulders. 

I’m reviewing my spells. Look, this is a spell that slows the fall of a person or an object.

No offense, Caleb, but that is a little unimpressive as far as your spells go.

Her elbow digs into him and he squirms. She readjusts. Her body is light, but burning hot against him. It’s a chilly day, and he finds himself enjoying the warmth. She pats his head absently. 

If you’re going to read over my shoulder, you could do it in a way that won’t cause my back to give out.

What’s the spell called? 

‘Featherfall.’ 

She remains as she is, draped over him, for a minute more: he can imagine her looking intently at his spellbook, her eyes narrowed. Then she releases him, and his body feels light and cold where the air hits the back of his neck. Nott repositions herself next to him, leaning against his arm. Warm and comfortable.

Teach me, she says.

You must truly be bored, he teases. He looks up and over to his satchel to fetch her a feather, and catches Beauregard, watching, pointedly rolling her eyes.

 

 


	12. nott, yeza — "stargazing"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **hurlumerlu asked: Any character(s) you want, stragazing ?**

Yeza asks if they can go outside. Just for a minute. So they do, and he’s disappointed, Nott can tell: she understands, he’s been in a cell, but _outside_ here means _weird endless nighttime_ , not the tall grasses and sunshine of home. 

Outside means Felderwin and safety and freedom, not darkness and Xhorhas and a goblin wife. 

She bites the inside of her cheek, very carefully, so as not to draw blood. 

Look, there are stars, though, she says, pointing.

She doesn’t mind the dark. It’s not her favorite. But she blends in. She can hide. Yeza could blink and she’d be lost in the shadows. He wouldn’t have to look at her. She wouldn’t need to be seen by him. But she points up at the sky, only taking a couple of steps away from the torchlight of the inn.

He treads out after her. They look the same as home? He makes it sound like a question.

They do that. They looked the same when we were at sea, too. I think. 

They stand there, in the dim light and fake nighttime of the inn’s courtyard.

See that bright one right there? Nott blurts out, pointing up with one clawed finger.

Yeah. That one?

Yeah. That’s a _planet_.

She glances back down. Yeza is looking at her.

Really. It’s a planet. Her face is hot.

It’s a planet. Huh. I never knew that before. He looks back up at the sky, smiling.


	13. nott, jester — "cuddling"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: nott &jester + cuddling**

Somehow or another, it’s usually them together in the cart. Nott is too short to ride a horse alone, and with the option of sharing a saddle or sprawling out in the cart’s bed, she usually picks the latter. Jester likes riding, but after a while she gets bored and kind of sore. The others, they’re kind of proud about it, the kind of pride that is really just stubbornness — they don’t get tired or sore! Not them!

So it’s her and Nott and Caleb in the cart, usually.

Caleb ignores Jester a lot, which is so dumb. He takes out his book and reads or looks at the same boring magical charts for hours, and when Jester tries to sneak up on him, he ignores her, so stubbornly she _knows_ he’s doing it on purpose, and that’s not fun at all. Nott, she has a trick for it. Jester will watch her sort of slide up to Caleb, putting her chin on his shoulder, and he’ll look away from his book at once.

It kind of makes Jester feel bad. Jealous. Not in a way where she wants to kiss anyone or be with anyone. But it reminds her a lot of her and her Momma, and she doesn’t like knowing that Caleb likes Nott more than her.

Jester likes Nott, too, of course. They can talk all day, which is great. Jester’s never met a goblin before, and Nott is really smart and really funny. They make up games and joke about everyone, joke about Caleb, they doodle in Jester’s sketchbook together. Nott teaches her “hang the goblin,” a kind of word guessing game. It’s sorta weird that Nott, a goblin, knows a game where you are drawing a little goblin in a little noose as you guess  a word, but whatever! It’s still fun! Jester cheats and uses words in Infernal. Nott cheats and uses words in Halfling, but funny words like “dick.”

Jester is like, so into all of her new friends. They’re all just so great. But Nott? They’re like, best friends. It’s so cool.

Riding in a cart all day is boring, though. Jester leaves and trades Molly for his horse, races and explores with Beau. That’s also great, she and Beau have a lot of fun looking around, finding stuff to climb, being like super sexy adventurers, they’re best friends too. 

Then she rides alongside Fjord for a while at the front of the cart, trying to chat with him. He talks to her, of course he does, but he always changes the subject when she pokes too much, and so Jester pokes just enough to figure it out, the shape and the boundaries of Fjord’s secrets. 

Then she and Molly giggle in Infernal together — his accent, his dialect, is just so different from hers and her Momma’s. They argue happily about who speaks it right and who is just making it up. They laugh at everyone else’s spooked faces.

And then Jester returns to the cart for a bit, giving Beau back her horse. Caleb is still reading. Nott is taking a nap, using their bag of potatoes as a pillow. Jester settles in between them. The day is warm and sunny, the sky a cloudless blue. 

Are you still reading? she asks Caleb.  

He ignores her, so she settles herself down with her sketchbook, drawing for the traveller some of the day’s events: the rock she and Beau climbed. Fjord on a ship. Beside her, Nott shifts, rolls over into Jester’s skirt. 

Jester pats her head absently, drawing Molly as a country farmer, with a straw hat on his head, his horns sticking out through the brim.

Nott’s arm wraps around Jester’s leg.

She’s cuddling me, Jester announces.

Ja, she does that, Caleb says, for the first time not pretending Jester isn’t there. 

Jester decides she doesn’t mind. Doesn’t mind Nott, she means. She hasn’t decided yet if she minds Caleb being rude all the time. (She doesn’t, they’re good friends too! But still. He’s like, such a _dick_.) 

She closes her notebook and slumps down, pulling her cloak up and balling it under her head as a pillow. She wraps her arms around Nott, who is snoring, and closes her eyes to take a nap in the bright sunshine of the afternoon. 

Jester wakes up a couple of hours later with Nott curled up next to her, her hand _totally_ on Jester’s boob, but you know what? That’s fine too. It’s a nice day, and they’re such good friends. After all.


	14. nott, yeza (caleb) — "cuddles"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: Honestly I would kill for some of your A+ Nott and Caleb fic rn. Like, anything soft, just something soft. With cuddles maybe. Is cuddles a prompt? I hope so.**

Veth introduces him to all her friends over dinner, more formally. Yeza hardly knows what to think, to tell the truth: they’re all — they’re — well. They’re all good people, kind people, clearly; it’s obvious in Veth’s eyes and voice, foreign and changed as both are. He tries not to look at her overlong, seeing her flinch whenever she catches him. But he can’t help it! She’s — she looks so different, so alien. But she moves and talks and her expressions are warped but the same. The way she quirks her eyebrows. The way her eyes narrow and the corner of her mouth twitches, how she smiles as she complains about things she doesn’t mean.

But it isn’t just that Veth is a goblin. She sits straighter than he’s ever seen her, even as she hides her face and limbs. She spars with the tall half-orc, the two bickering all through dinner, Veth poking fun at him getting lost in the dining room: he’s seen her quick and clever, but she’s sharper now, bolder, picking on Mr Fjord with a straight face, not mumbling under her breath. She’s always been strong and steely and brave, but Yeza had sometimes wondered if he was the only one who knew it. Now, Veth glows with a confident surety he’s never seen before, never expected given her strange new form.

It must be in part due to her new friends. 

 

Mr Fjord, who is polite and tolerates Veth’s teasing with exasperation and retorts and even temper. Ms. Beauregard, who is awkward and uncomfortable and quick to take offense on Veth’s behalf. Mr. Clay, who is the largest person Yeza has ever seen, but who he instantly likes, is instantly comfortable by and with: he’s calm and a keen lover of plants and lichens and the components. Ms. Yasha, who is large and intimidating but gentle-voiced. 

Then there is Jester, who Yeza feels like he half knows, already, just from her ease and brightness and from hearing her voice in his head for weeks. Jester, who Veth grins with and giggles with, Jester who interrupts with stories about Nott-I-mean-Veth- _sorry_ and whose interruptions Veth latches on to and enjoys. The others all smile at the two as they brag and play off one another: Yeza smiles. She is clearly a good friend. Veth likes all her companions, even Mr. Fjord, but Jester more than most, he can tell, and he’s happy to see it.

Last, there is Mr. Caleb, who Veth had called out to alone back in the cell, who she had introduced to him first and then had clarified that she did not think romantically about. So of course Yeza had immediately wondered: what? Should I be worried? Why would you even bring that up? — and he was much too tired and hungry and weary to even start to ponder — gods, Veth was _alive_ , he’d worry about the rest some other time — she was alive and he was _free_ — except. Mr. Caleb watches him and Veth all through dinner, mostly silent. Yeza looks at Veth, trying to get used to her new face, her breathing, living body, and Veth gets bashful and Yeza looks away to spare her, and every time Mr. Caleb is looking at them both. And every time, he is half smiling.

He’s my friend. He saved my life, Veth had said.

 

The next morning, he wakes up sore from the floor and starving and weak and still tired and yet, refreshed. Veth is already awake and gone and he half falters: where is he? Why is he on the floor? until he hears movement. She’s sitting up on the bed, going through her pack.

After she’s finished fretting — something Yeza allows with a smile, because she looks different, so strange, but the pinched determination is exactly the same and he’s missed her bossy fussing — they get to talking a bit.

She stayed with the goblins for a little while — Veth’s vague on the time, the details, and he notices but doesn’t push, isn’t sure yet he’s ready to know — and then left, and met Caleb then. They met the others some time later. They’re called the Mighty Nein, although Veth is vague on why or how they landed on the name, only that it was in Alfield they’d chosen it. I can’t believe you were so close, this whole time, he tells her, thinking of the grave, the flowers he and Luke place there every month.

She shakes her head. I wasn’t — I don’t know what I was. I haven’t gone by Veth in a long time, everyone calls me Nott now. 

Which he’d noticed, of course. As well as that Caleb alone has been using her real name.

You seem — Gods, Veth. You’re doing great. You’re —

Her face shutters itself somewhat. 

You are.

Look at me, she says bitterly.

He does, and he understands what she means, but also understands that even strange and twisted and changed, she moves and acts as she always has. No: with a straighter back and neck, a new sharpness and confidence.

You all seem very close, he says instead, sparing her.

She tells him more. About the others. Her and Jester solving case after case, crime after crime. And about Caleb, who took care of her and protected her, who she took care of in turn. She keeps coming back to Caleb, even when talking about the others: _we met Cad in this graveyard, and Caleb — so Beau is like this monk secret agent, which Caleb_ — and he starts to get a better image of the shape of things: it isn’t an affair he needs to worry about. 

She catches him smiling. What? Veth asks, her eyes narrowed the way they always do.

When we go home, will we need to build an extra bedroom? For Mr. Caleb?

He’s just joking, but she flushes a mottled brown-green. 

Jester was just kidding. He’s not — I mean, I’ve protected him, he’s — he’s _mine_ , but that doesn’t mean… 

I’m sorry. I was just teasing. 

Veth looks troubled. Embarrassed. 

They agree to drop it for now and go downstairs for breakfast.

 

 

Mr. Caleb is  already there, with most of the others. He looks up immediately when Yeza and Veth appear, starts to say something, stops, and smiles strained. 

Good morning.

Hey, says Veth, awkward and shy. She sits next to Caleb at the table, and Yeza takes the seat to her right, observing with curiosity and new knowledge. Breakfast is somewhat bland, with only a few slivers of some meat and porridge.

Caleb immediately takes his meat and slides it into Veth’s bowl. 

They all talk, and Caleb touches Veth’s shoulder, casually, both hardly seeming to notice. He says he wants to look for a bookshop or library, and Veth immediately says she’ll join. Yeza is a little, but not very, bemused: Veth had never been much of a reader, but perhaps her tastes have changed? Then she changes her mind, asking Caleb for his permission. They argue about money.

When they part ways, Yeza looks back to see Caleb watching Veth retreat. 

When they meet back up later, he watches Veth brighten and check on Caleb. She touches his hand. His posture relaxes. She asks him if he found any books, her expression narrow and bossy, _you better have or I’ll do it for you_ , a look Yeza knows well, and he grins.

 

 

He catches them having a whispered conversation a little bit later. Not really catches: Yeza’s still, you know, right there, but they talk unconcerned by his presence, Veth leaning up and Caleb leaning down, both towards one another.

Was it okay sharing a room with Fjord? 

Of course. It was fine.

I’m sorry that —

What are you sorry for? Caleb asks sharply.

Veth sighs. Nothing, I guess, she admits, her voice now cheeky.

Caleb smiles at her with such warmth that Yeza can’t help but stare openly. And you?

It was fine, Veth says, looking over her shoulder  at Yeza. He smiles uncertainly, and she smiles back: too many teeth, but an expression he knows. Happy, and a bit sly: she’s making a joke and he’s missing it. As usual.

I don’t mind sharing with Fjord. I’m happy to, as long as…

You two normally sleep together? Yeza interjects, suddenly piecing it together.

Not in a weird way!

I - I  assure you, I would never take any sort of, ehm, liberties with… Veth…

You slept with your sister when you were little, didn’t you? Veth demands hotly.

Yeza’s sort of taken aback, by the way they both turned on him, both blushing. Ah — he says. 

Caleb is blinking at Veth, looking so absurdly flattered and shocked that Yeza finds himself grinning: it’s honestly a pretty funny expression, with Veth looking heated and huffy the way she is.

It’s — it’s okay. Thank you for taking care of Veth. I’m sorry for, um, messing with your usual arrangements.

Oh, no, it is no trouble — it’s just a habit, it isn’t as though we sleep together often, or, um…

It’s fine, it’s, you know, usually it’s boys and girls so it’s not —

Yeza is taken aback by all the embarrassed arguing again. 

Veth breaks first, ever too honest to lie. Okay, we sleep together all the time, she admits, tugging at her strange new ears.

Caleb’s face matches his hair and beard as he tries to keep wording some sort of excuse.

Yeza smiles and offers up his hand. I’m glad Veth has someone she’s so close to. Thank you for looking after her.

Ah — 

Caleb’s shakes his hand tentatively, shyly, his grip weak.

Your wife — I owe her everything and more. I should thank you for her happiness, truly.

He’s polite, but half mumbles it, embarrassed. Yeza feels a sudden and great warm sympathy.

Not at all. I couldn’t — I couldn’t ever do any of this. I’m glad Veth’s found you people. And a friend like you especially. 

I’ll — I’ll do my utmost to keep Veth safe, for you and your son both. I promise you.

Thank you. That — if she has people who love her even half as much as I do, I can relax for sure.

I assure you — Caleb hesitates. I… we do.

Okay, so we fucking cuddle! All the fucking time! So what!? Veth interjects, not having been paying any attention at all.

 

 


	15. nott, caleb — "spellbook"

She’s happy to show him the message spell. It’s easy. Caleb had really been the one to put the work in, to figure it all out — Nott just put the bits together. She explains it to him, peering up and over across the bed like he’s giving her a test, asking her to prove his work, the way her teachers used to, back when she was Veth and went to school.

Caleb corrects her: I do not know this spell. Honestly I do not.

No, you told me about it. You told me there were spells that let you talk to people.

There’s no point in arguing about it. She doesn’t know why he’s being so stubborn about taking the credit. But she shows him the parts she figured out: how to twist her fingers around, the way wire works but string doesn’t.

After Caleb has the knack for it — _so_ quickly, she’s so proud — he frustrates her by insisting on mapping it all out in his book.

Caleb. You don’t have to do that. It’s not that kind of magic. You can just do it.

Yes, but it is a good habit, it is good to write your magic down, it helps you understand — here, see, and he’d tried to show her in diagrams, how this abbreviated bit of lines and terms was the same as this bit in this other spell… Nott listens politely. Makes encouraging sounds.

He notices her boredom. Perhaps you’d like your own spell book? he asks, his eyes lighting up.

I don’t know how to memorize magic. I just copied you. I’m not …

She imagines having a spell book. Writing out spells and studying all the lines and words. Waving her hands around and throwing bolts of ice or acid or fire. It makes her chest tight with anxiety. She can’t do that. She’d look stupid even trying.

But a few days later, Caleb presents her with a small book. Halfling sized, goblin sized, comfortable in her hands. A plain good smelling leather cover, a few dozen thick blank pages.

She says thank you and he looks happy.

To please him, that night, Nott opens it to the first page and borrows a pen and some of his special ink. He offers to help her, but she tells him no thanks. Is aware of him watching, smiling, proudly, as she writes neatly on the top of the first page.

 

 

Six months later, and her spellbook remains mostly empty. Message on the first page, and the second a numbered list of her other tricks: an illusion, an illusion that’s really good, shocking people (not rugs).

Page three: Featherfall, meticulously copied from Caleb’s book.

Page four: the recipe for brewing acid, the recipe for brewing flamable oil.

Page five and six: doodles of dicks, a joint collaboration in the back of a cart.

The rest was empty, and Nott had given the book to Caleb for safe keeping, feeling guilty when he’d tucked the notebook in with his own books under his coat, before she’d forgotten it entirely.

Caleb flips through it now. Only a week ago she’d narrowed her eyes at fire giants and turned herself invisible, and yet he sees no trace of the spell in her book, which she hasn’t asked for or touched in weeks. He’d wanted to check, just to make sure. But no.

Do you know how clever you are? He’s sure he’s asked her. Remembers her queasy smile.

He traces his fingers over the dried ink on the first page: _This spell lets me talk to Caleb,_ in her surprisingly tidy handwriting.

Caleb puts the book away, smiling.


	16. nott, caleb — "height difference"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: Caleb and Nott: pros and cons of having a massive height difference**

**PRO:**

The first time Caleb suggests that Nott pretend to be his child, he can see she doesn’t like the idea. She doesn’t say so, but she hesitates, looks askance, agrees only slowly. He’s driven to explain further: no one would believe them siblings, no matter how well they hid the little goblin’s form. In the interest of fairness, he does mention they _could_ try to pass for lovers — but she draws away at once. Child is fine. She’ll pretend to be a child. She doesn’t mind. 

No one suspects a child, Caleb tells her, trying to encourage a ruse she clearly dislikes and he already half regrets. I’ll set you down and you can slip behind me, take the things we need. If you are caught — which you will certainly not be — I will pretend to punish you, apologize for your youth and irresponsibility. No one looks twice at a child. 

That’s not true, she says, which he takes at the time for sullen discomfort, a fear for being caught. 

He’s never asked her her age. Caleb doesn’t know how goblins age, only that they have short and violent lifespans. He assumes she’s a young adult, perhaps the age he had been —

Either way. Regardless. The plan goes off without a hitch. Nott fills the bag under her cloak with food and supply and even a healing potion as Caleb talks desperately to the shopkeeper. She may not enjoy posing as a child, and he resolves to not force the scheme too often — but they eat well and sleep with full bellies that night, and he thinks: you cannot argue with  results.

 

**PRO:**

She is fast, his little friend. Quicker than he by far, and surprisingly silent, nearly graceful: he blunders heavy through the woods, kicks stones on roads, and she keeps up, a quiet shadow. 

But her stride is much shorter than his, and a day of walking exhausts her more than it does him. It surprises Caleb at first. He is no bastion of strength and stamina, and she is so quick and certain — but he is used to walking miles and miles a day, each day, for weeks and months and years. He’s never asked, but he gets the sense that Nott is newer to long journeys. She doesn’t complain much, but her stream of chatter fades over the course of the day, until, by late afternoon, she has fallen several paces behind.

He begins to offer her his back. To carry her piggy-back, just short distances, to reach this stand of trees or that abandoned barn, when she begins lagging and they’re almost at a good spot to rest. 

I’m not a child, she reminds him, her voice prim the odd way it gets sometimes. 

Odd, but it makes him smile. 

Nott is not a complainer, but she’s — she’s a bit lazy. He’s noticed. If he offers to pick up slack, she never argues. She barely hesitates at the offer. She doesn’t want to walk anymore.

He’s not strong, but she’s light, and it’s — Caleb doesn’t know. Only that somehow he enjoys it. Catches himself half smiling. She rests her chin on the crown of his head and offers commentary in half a whisper. Gods, you tall people see far. What’s that thing over there? Caleb, let’s go check it out. Yah!, and she kicks at his shoulders with her heels.

 

**PRO:**

She’s small and weighs next to nothing, and over time he grows more familiar with her, more comfortable with her. There’s an intimacy between them after eight, nine months of sharing inns and haylofts and beds. He picks her up. He forgets to ask, sometimes — he knows she does not like to be treated as a child — but often he’ll lift her and she’ll settle into his arms like a cat, her arms strong against his neck, her pose almost regal as she leans against his shoulder, he her willing courtier. 

There is something he likes and cannot name about it. About how she is so small and strong and yet so fragile, how he can embrace her and she almost vanishes entirely in the cavity of his chest and arms. Some twisted possessive masculine thing, perhaps, some impulse he thought long dead and murdered: she is small and she is a goblin, but he looks at her and thinks: I can protect _her_. Not his family, not anyone he cared for or loved, but this clever child, this dear girl. They usually touch or overlap slightly, sleeping — her head on his ankle, his elbow brushing her spine — but the night Mollymauk is killed, it is snowing, it is freezing, bitter cold, they are afraid and they are sad and they are broken, all of them. She sleeps curled up against his chest, her cheek pressed to his heart, and he pulls her as close as he can, wraps his arms around her. She is so small, it is easy, it is possible. She is so small. Perhaps he can keep her, at least, safe.

 

**CON** :

“I wish you were a normal size,” Nott grumbles one day.

Caleb blinks. “By human standards, I am a normal size. I am very average.” 

“I wish you were a halfling. Or a gnome or something,” she adds quickly. “Just sometimes.”

“Why?” he asks, amused, nearly smiling.

“No reason.” 

They keep walking for a minute.

“Do you wish you were human sized?” he asks presently.

“A human-sized goblin would be a freakshow for sure.”

“Then a human, say.”

She’s quiet for a long moment. “I don’t mind being small. It’s just that it would be nice, to be able to pick _you_ up for once, or for people to think _you_ were the kid and I was the adult, or…”

“You’d carry me if we were the same size?” Caleb asks, with amusement. 

“It’s not weird. You do it all the time,” she says, her voice sharp with embarrassment. 

“I didn’t think you minded.” He feels an unexpected pang of hurt, choses his words carefully. “I do not mean to…”

“I like it,” she says quietly. “It makes me feel like… you know, like I’m special or something.” Which she says so quickly it slurs into one mumbled word. “I just want to do it too, take care of you, like a normal… — like I —” 

She doesn’t rephrase or finish her sentence, although he waits in case she does.

 

 


	17. nott, caleb — "love"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: Nott and Caleb - love (gimme angsty but wholesome besties)**

Nott has said it eighteen times, now. 

Not that Caleb is keeping special track, special attention, but: eighteen times. Total. He tracks the grammar, the intent and meaning: verb forms and conjugations, gerunds and infinitives, active and passive voice. Eighteen times, Nott has said she loves him.

The first time had been six months and fourteen days ago. _You know I love how much you love books, but we need to get going,_ she’d said nervously, when he had been lingering overlong in a shop and the Crownsguard had started to take note of the pair. He hadn’t been listening until the fourth word, which had hit him like a shard of ice to the heart. Yet: it had not been serious. Exasperated, if anything, although Nott was far too even-tempered to truly be angry, even when she was right to be, and he’d dismissed it as a figure of speech.

 

The sixth time had been four months and three days ago. The girls had been riding in the cart together, and Frumpkin had been purring in Nott’s lap; Caleb had been walking, occasionally peeking in on them, just to make sure all was well — a quick glance through his cat, two strides worth of time, only every hour or so. He’d peeked in. Nott had been scratching his ( _Frumpkin’s_ ) ears, bragging. _Yup, I love that about him, too._

 _About whom?_ Caleb had wondered, his stomach twisting with suspicion. 

 _But he smells **so bad** ,_ Jester giggled.

Caleb had popped out of Frumpkin before Nott’s retort, aware he was hearing something he ought to not, something he should not know, something that sends him stumbling and red-faced and lagging behind the group, lost in his thoughts.

 

 

Caleb has said it to three people in his life. Three people that he is conscious of, was cognizant of the meaning in saying it. _Don’t worry, I’ll be fine, I love you_ , had been his last words to his mother before leaving for the Academy. 

For example.

 

 

 

He’s said it to his mother, and to his father.

He said it to Astrid.

Look how all that came out.

 

 

The fourteenth time had been after they had escaped the Blue Dragon. Caduceus’s healing had done much for Nott’s wounds, but she had still been sore and exhausted, hadn’t protested much when he brought them to bed. Caleb had barely been able to speak. He’d had only this silly, childish urge — to hold onto her. To not let her out of his grasp and sight, as though losing her would mean her death. Stupid, really. He was the coward here, not her.

But she hadn’t argued, just snuggled up under his ribs, her ears drooping flat against her head. She smelt of blood and ozone and ash. He’d tried to pat her damp hair. _It’s okay,_ she said sleepily, trying to soothe him, although _he_ was the coward and _she_ had nearly died. _It’s okay. Don’t worry. You’re fine. I love you._

The sixteenth had been in the tunnels. After it all, after they left Felderwin, the first night sleeping below ground. Nott and Caleb sitting together in a quiet corner, both uncertain the other wished for their company. Nott had spoken in a quiet panic, at length, as he’d sat on cold stone and tried to overlay Nott — skin and bones and long fingered, expressive ears, cat eyed — with the woman they’d seen in her illusion. Soft and dark haired in an embroidered dress. 

 _And I didn’t want to lie, I mean, not exactly, it was just really hard to tell you the_ truth _, and you never_ asked _, not that I’m blaming you. A- and I love them, of course I do, they’re my family, Caleb, but you’re — I mean, I - I  love you too, and please don’t be mad, please don’t._

His whole body had been heavy. His heart. His tongue in his mouth. He’d put his arm around her. Given her a squeeze. She’d sniffled and leaned against him. _We’ll get your fellow back_ , he’d promised.

 

 

Number seventeen: He’s so smart, it’s one of the things I love most about him, she’d bragged, licking breakfast crumbs from her fingers.

 

 

Caleb has known he loves her for a long time now. 

He doesn’t know when exactly he started, when he first noticed it. Only that one day he’d woken up in a basement and Nott’s head had been pillowed on his thigh, her body curled loosely in sleep. He’d blinked down at her, surprised by her presence. She’d stirred. He’d felt the tightness in his chest and belly, the warmth and the pain, and he’d thought: _I love her_. This strange girl. This dear child. Who gave him a scroll and protection and a name.

He loves her.

 

 

He means to tell her after the dragon. After Felderwin. After she survives fire giants and lava. He means to tell her after she grits her teeth and clings to him and dives off the _Mistake_ with the rest of them. Or perhaps in the shadow of Mollymauk’s grave. In the inn, when she tells him she loves the Mighty Nein and will stay, he should have said it then, perhaps. Or maybe when she’d flipped through his spellbooks and turned herself invisible, made a manticore forget her in magical laughter, killed a mountain giant in an arena, spoken Yeza’s name for the first time while searching for rocks. 

He’s never said it. 

Not once.

 

 

Caleb watches her start, eyes wide, when Yeza takes her hand. She ducks her head and her fingers curl around his, and he smiles to see her bashful. Smiles, to see her happy and wet-eyed. He’s happy to walk behind the couple, happy to see their hands joined together, the way Yeza’s gaze darts from their surroundings to his wife every few seconds, to remind himself she’s truly there. Caleb isn’t — he isn’t sure he could be any happier. For anyone. That anyone could deserve it more.

He hastens his pace to clasp a hand on Nott’s shoulder. Just for a moment. _I’m so happy for you. I’m so proud of you. I love you_. 

He doesn’t say it.

He walks ahead, and leaves her to her husband.


	18. frumpkin — "observations on nott"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous: fic idea maybe: frumpkin's thoughts on the whole Nott situation, not (ayy) just her current breakdown but her and his wizard's friendship/Emotional Bond For Life?**

It is a Being, It is a Spirit, it twists among the branches of the Wild and it clatters and climbs and stalks, curls in the red sunset shadows. It curls up with others and it curls up alone, others who are like It in form or desire: for mischief some, for knowledge some, for power some — they travel in packs else alone, they climb and fly and pull in packs, hunting and hunted, orange skies, green jewel trees, light in prisms and vapors; it is unremarkable, it is Home. It exists there — It remembers not its Moment of Beginning, some of Its Fellows leave or go elsewhere, their passing unnoticed — more appear, more join the pack, It leaves the pack for a time, It drinks cool forest waters alone.

One day It has ears and they prick up for there is a Pull —

It has eyes and they open to see a great shape before it, limbs and blueish eyes, watery. “Oh!” the being says in half a whisper, awestruck and wet-eyes. Oh. Oh, Frumpkin, you are…

It is he is Frumpkin. He is now a cat. He is This Being’s own.

This Being calls himself Martin first. And then immediately: Brendan. Bren.

Then: Franz, Gordon, Tim, Jan, Rys, Conner, Jon, Jakob.

Frumpkin’s form changes as well. He is a cat mostly. Sometimes he is not. He has no opinion on this: he will serve This Being because that is his purpose; he is now a _his_ and his name is Frumpkin. This Being tells him how to act, pours his mind into Frumpkin in a jumble: an image/command of an orange cat who is not Frumpkin but _is_ Frumpkin, and so he does as is imagined/asked. Sit. Purr. Loaf. It is he, a cat, and he is This Being’s will. It is he, and he is Frumpkin, a cat. Thus it shall be. Thus is thine shape. Eternal. As the red sunsets of that other place. Home.

This Being talks to Frumpkin and Frumpkin learns. Of “men” and “mud” and “loss” and this world. He is a cat and he is as a cat. He curls and purrs. Pushes his head at This Being’s elbow and limbs. It is pleasurable to be rubbed. It fills This Being’s desire to have something to rub. Silver ivy sprouts and winds from his fingers and his elbows. Frumpkin purrs and shows his belly. The ivy wraps. Frumpkin aglow.

Yet.

This Being is unformed and unsettled. He shifts and twists and stalks, hides and climbs and hunts alone. Hunts. Is hunted. Frumpkin pushes at him. Frumpkin does not _think_ , he is a Being/Creature/This Being’s own. And yet he thinks: Settle, tha. Choose thy form. Myne? But a cat. He sits. He purrs. Heed, This Being. My Being. Heed me.

This Being is thus Caleb.

Caleb meets a creature, and the creature makes him so: she speaks and he heeds and he is Caleb. Caleb waits to take a new form, but Frumpkin sees/smells the growth and the branches, and knows (without thinking) that Caleb shall not. He is settled. It is this creature. It is not Frumpkin. That Caleb has heeded.

Frumpkin does not think, Frumpkin is but Caleb’s Form, and yet: Frumpkin does not like this.

He does not like this creature, who smells of river water and dark shadows. She is formed, but her words say: I am unformed. I am unsettled. I have always been thus. So says her fingers and her still-water smell, and there is no harm in multiplicity and shapes, for had Frumpkin a self before he was Frumpkin, and yet This One settles and creates Caleb, and so Frumpkin trusts her not at all.

For is Caleb not His Own? Is he not This Being’s?

Frumpkin sleeps proudly in Caleb’s arms. This One sleeps at his feet. Fretful and tossing.

Frumpkin is a bird. Frumpkin is a legged-fish-thing. Frumpkin is It again and then called forth and then It and then Forth and then Frumpkin, even whilst away: Frumpkin claws and tears through Caleb’s magic and emerges in a dim room. Caleb scoops him up. He curls. This One is watching. She asks: Are you okay?

Yes, says Caleb.

Frumpkin hears: burning wood, wet humid air. He cannot breathe and yet he is panting, he is falling, his knees wet in the morning dew. Eod tugs on his arm. What’s gotten into you, man? He asks, but he does not hear it. The heat is enormous. Intense. Frumpkin hears: a dark mine. An angry yelp and a massive beast. He lurches forward terrified as it snaps down at her, as the monk races forward and he breathes for the first time — relief crashing his lungs — she scoops her up as the creature bites and the small figure goes limp and still. A splash of blood and he breathes and does not know how, his lungs are not working and yet he is panting, the monk rushes her closer and yet she is unmoving, still, a gash on her cheek spilling blood on her face —

Frumpkin hears: the burning of a house. The roaring flames. A figure in a cave shrieking, flames in his nose, his mouth, his eyes, burning. Bren, someone shouted. Bren! Bren!

Yes, says Caleb.

This One puts her acid bottle down carefully. Sits next to him and Frumpkin on the bed. Pushing herself up against his ribs. A gash on her cheek still healing. He takes her hand. She pats Frumpkin’s side.

Okay. Good.

Ah, see: Frumpkin is This Being’s. Frumpkin is This Being’s soul made Cat. This One is This Being’s, but in a different way. She is not made of him. But she makes him. And he makes her. Thus: they, too, are made of one another. Thus: Frumpkin no longer mistrusts This One.

Nott.

The others are companions. Pack. Flock and murder. They join and they leave and they die. Frumpkin mistrusts them as Caleb, mourns them as Caleb, misses and likes and dislikes as Caleb does.

He is a bird and he is New This One’s for a time. He neither likes or trusts her, and yet he must, because she now has hold of him and his secrets, and so: Frumpkin does. She puts him in her pocket and he tolerates it for he is of her now: she places him on a bedpost to perch and sleeps, first giggling with Tricky One and then sleeping in fits and starts and stretched limb.

Frumpkin fluffs his feathers. Preens and grooms with his beak. Picks for nits and at once is lying in another bed, sheets kicked far away. In the haze of not-quite-sleep. Nott is heavy and sweaty on his arm. Snoring softly. He almost wants to move her, but her fingers are digging and he is thinking about today, the way she’d gone pale and sickly when Fjord had mentioned going into the ocean. He’s hot and uncomfortable. He thinks: yet, best let her rest, she…

He thinks about his name and about love and he drifts into uneasy sleep.

Frumpkin wakes up when New This One grabs him in her fist and pushes him happily into her pocket.

The pod, the band, the school continues to turn and flock and wheel. It has more beings now, or perhaps the same, but sharper and more important to Caleb and thus to Frumpkin’s attention. Nott remains the center. Beau slips up the sides. Nott has her own swarm. She admits: my name was Veth.

Frumpkin hears what he had always known:

I was Settled before. I had a form before we met. It was called Wife and Mother. And thus there were others I attached to; my name was not Me but His. Truly it was thus. I was still His, as well, when I met you. I was Caleb’s. Thou were he.

Ah, there is nay shame in it, Frumpkin says, curled around her neck in the tunnel they walk through. See? I too am so. I am His for He formed Me. We think the same, for I have no thoughts he has not. There is no sorrow. I am of him.

She strokes his back and they look at Caleb.

Frumpkin thinks: I hope she knows that I… That I what? I don’t know what I hope. Everything — it could not have been a lie. And yet — no. No. It doesn’t matter. You must… I hope she knows that I —

Frumpkin thinks: Ah, thou forgets. She is borne of you as you of her. Creatures are packs and I am This One’s, but some lines are in truth circles.

Vines twist around what is in reach. They twist and spiral and hold fast and strong.

Thus is the way of creatures.


	19. caleb, nott — "raise dead"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Anonymous:** For a fic proposal: As a transmutation wizard, Caleb will be able to cast Raise Dead with his transmuter's stone when he reaches 14th level. Maybe a ficlet where there are no clerics around and he's the only one that can bring back Nott?

With a final, sick _crack_ of dark energy, the last of the giants fall to Jester’s spell.

Caleb lowers his hand.

Beau slumps to her knees, exhausted and bleeding — but not dying. Fjord offers her a hand, his sword loose in his fist. Jester clutches her talisman, pale and bleeding. Caduceus bustles forward, already beginning a healing spell. Caleb takes a step forward —

Frowns.

Where is Nott?

She had begun the fight invisible, hiding, and he’d noted her presence a few times through the battle. She was at her best in the shadows, and it was a relief for him, of course, to not have to worry about her as well as himself and the rest —

“Mr. Caleb, if you stick around a minute… alright,” Caduceus calls, starts to call, as Caleb wanders off.

“Ja, I’m okay,” he responds vaguely. The last time Nott had fired it had come from around here…

He feels the first prickle of anxiety. Of fear. Tells himself he’s being foolish, even as he replays every moment of the battle in his head. Three giants, it was a lot to keep track of. Two had been in the thick of it the entire time, but the last one…

He moves around a cluster of rocks, twisting his wire around in one hand. It’s directional, that’s the problem. He’s not quite sure where she is… And doesn’t want to cast it to no reply. Silly. Ridiculously superstitious. And yet…

“Caleb? What’s wrong?” Fjord calls.

“Ah… has anyone seen Nott?”

There’s a beat of silence. Beau swears loudly. Jester calls out: “Nott!”

No answer, and in the silence grows the sick feeling in his belly, the anxious twisting, the coldness in his fingers and limbs.

Murmuring behind him. He keeps moving, now into the brush. Caduceus abandons his spell. Jester is calling out. He hears quick footsteps, Beau’s, heading his way.

There is something on the ground beside this tree.

A sapling, really. Not much taller than Caleb. Thin and spindly and poor cover. Bent and snapped where the giant must have hit it. Half fallen over the shape beneath it.

The shape.

The —

 

 

 

He had been taught long ago. Unpleasant lessons, useful ones. To maintain focus through pain. To maintain concentration no matter the distraction. Do not flinch, do not cry out. Even if it hurts. You must be stronger. You must be able to retain your focus. Or what sort of soldier will you be?

 

 

 

She smells of pine sap, and of blood.

Her crossbow still in her hand, a bolt still notched to fire.

 

 

 

Beau has her hand on his shoulder and is speaking. Beau is moving away and calling out. He feels no pain. He is calm and he is focused. It is a test. It is a lesson.

His hand still in his pocket. Still holding the wire. Useless. He lets go.

He holds his stone in his fist. His lucky rock. The grove on one side, perfect for tracing with a finger. The ring around the middle. Stepping gingerly around mud in the reeds. Crickets and frogs and birds humming around them. Kiri collecting pebbles, humming a little song.

She had skimmed right over the mud with that ring of hers, picking up stone after stone. This one? How about this one? What about this, this one’s nice? And throwing the rejects with perfect aim at branches and logs and mud puddles, until she’d found one with a ring, a lucky stone, the perfect rock, and presented it to him proudly.

 

 

 

On the beach he’d collected shells with a mind towards giving them to her son. An idle pastime, something pleasant to do in the sunshine of the afternoon. She’d said: I love you.

She’d said: I want you to kill me, please.

 

 

 

There had been no bodies for his mother and father.

 

 

 

Come back, he says to the form in his arms, on his lap. It’s not the way you would choose, but you know I am not a very good person, and so I will not start now. Even if this isn’t what you want, _come back_. Even if you think it is wrong, I demand it. Come back. I don’t have the power to rend time for you, too.

The stone is hot as an ember.

The others are now around him. Perhaps they have been for some time.

Jester offers flowers and ribbons and jewelry. And tears.

Fjord calls her a pain in the ass in a voice familiar, yet not his own.

Beau’s fingers dig into his shoulder. A focal point. Pain. Bright and sharp. He must not lose concentration.

It would be easier to rest, but you must be brave. And I will not be selfless. I demand you keep your promise. You must keep your promise to me, so that I can keep mine to you.

Come back.

He casts _message_ , not with wire but with stone, and the rock burns and glows and splits in two. Exactly along the ring.

 

 

 

Nott’s body grows warmer. She takes in a shallow breath, and in his arms, she opens her eyes.


End file.
